D&D General How Do You Like Your In Person Tactical Setup?

[MNblockhead]

I sometimes use a metal picture frame, with just the glass only. Then place the glass over a nice map, for minis, and use erasable markers on the glass to draw various effects and features.

That's a cool idea. Not sure why I never thought of that. If I were to go back to using large plotter-printed maps, or even pieced together maps printed on multiple sheets of letter/A4 sized paper, I would probably go to Home Depot, Lowes, or similar store and by sheets of plexi glass and cut them to 2 or 3 sizes of sheets.

I do think that the frame on the glass would be a cool look...but I'm cheap.

 

[Yaarel]

That's a cool idea. Not sure why I never thought of that. If I were to go back to using large plotter-printed maps, or even pieced together maps printed on multiple sheets of letter/A4 sized paper, I would probably go to Home Depot, Lowes, or similar store and by sheets of plexi glass and cut them to 2 or 3 sizes of sheets.

I do think that the frame on the glass would be a cool look...but I'm cheap.

Go to a thrift shop. By a picture of a poster under glass. Remove the poster, and use the frame and glass. Make sure the frame is metal because it will be easier to unscrew, remove the metal springs, and reassemble.

If the frame would be wood, you likely would need to deal with unusual staple shapes, contend with adhesives, and likely need special equipment to reassemble it.

The plexiglass, I dont know but imagine, would stain if using an erasable marker. It also scratches easily. Use glass. Glass stays more clean, and better resists scratches.

 

[Yaarel]

@MNblockhead

Oh, and remember the glass in a frame has edges that are extremely sharp. So be careful while disassembling and assembling.

 

[Meech17]

Have you looked into 2D minis? They are not going to be as impressive on the table as $20 (and often much higher) professionally hand-painted 3D miniatures, but you can get good art on a 2D standee for a small fraction of the money. There are fancier plastic standees from Arcknight or thick cardboard ones that Kobold Press and others sell to go with their bestiaries.

The best bang for you buck is to buy a paper cutter (Cricket and Silhouette are the two most popular brands), get good quality hard stock and buy the mini art from various makers on Drive Thru RPG or Patreon. Some of them come with the paper cutter files so you just have to print and cut. But even for those that don't, after a bit of a learning curve I soon found it easy to quickly set up the cut file from the art in the free Silhouette software that came with the machine. Get a bunch of plastic stands from Litko for various creature sizes.

When I was running games in person, this was a godsend. If I was was already spending thousands on Dwarven Forge terrain or spending a lot of time (and money) making fancy terrain myself with a 3D printer or plaster casting, they might seem out of place. But, like you, I didn't want to spend that kind of money (or time) on terrain that I likely would not get a lot of reuse out of--or worse, would let the investment in terrain influence the encounter setups so I could get more use out of them, rather than running what I though was best for the story. Instead, I used lower cost terrain options and eventually went to a digital battlemap (i.e. a TV laid down horizontally). In that context 2 minis look great.

I could make zombie hordes in an an hour or so. Nice full color art, lots of variety among the different pieces. I could print gargantuan-sized creatures for the cost of a sheet of card stock and some printer ink. I had also went through a phase of printing tokens and cutting them out with a 1" punch. But I can print and cut for less effort using a paper cutting machine. The only advantage of tokens/pogs is they are ready to place a bit more quickly than 2D standees (which have to be slotted into bases before setting on a map).

The other advantage of 2D standings (and tokens) is how easy their are to store and transport.

I have actually.. I'm really just torn on which to get. I don't have a very good printer, (I mostly print off my DM resources at work. shhh ) so I'm not sure about the print at home options. I'm leaning towards Skinny Minis. I just haven't pulled the trigger yet.

 

[MNblockhead]

I have actually.. I'm really just torn on which to get. I don't have a very good printer, (I mostly print off my DM resources at work. shhh ) so I'm not sure about the print at home options. I'm leaning towards Skinny Minis. I just haven't pulled the trigger yet.

I just bought a cheap Epson WF printer. I like the epson because it uses different cartridges for the colors. I find a save a bit on cartridges that way. Really any cheap printer these days will be fine so long as it can handle card stock. Most do, but you'd likely want to avoid portable printers.

A paper printer and paper cutter are going to cost much less than a 3D printer and the paints to print the miniatures.

I only have experience with the Silhouette Brand. Cricket may be more popular, but I've never used one. I really liked the Silhouette software that came with the cutter. There is a bit of a learning curve, but for me, most of the learning curve was getting the right settings for the cutter pressure for the card stock I was using. Too much pressure, you'll end up having to replace the sticky mat very often. Two light and you want have a clean cut.

 

[grimmgoose]

I've bought several "generic" tokens from Etsy (like THIS), which is what we use when we drop down a battlemap.

I have players that love painting minis, but tracking HP is much easier to say, "Red 3 takes 13 points of slashing damage" rather than, "the goblin with the blue armor - no, the other goblin."

I've tried a bunch of options for in-person, and spent a ton of money on terrain, tech, etc. - but the thing that works best for us is just a map and generic tokens.

 

[Meech17]

I've bought several "generic" tokens from Etsy (like THIS), which is what we use when we drop down a battlemap.

I have players that love painting minis, but tracking HP is much easier to say, "Red 3 takes 13 points of slashing damage" rather than, "the goblin with the blue armor - no, the other goblin."

I've tried a bunch of options for in-person, and spent a ton of money on terrain, tech, etc. - but the thing that works best for us is just a map and generic tokens.

The Campaign Case tokens are nice, and the clings stick to the tokens well. They also provided small numbered clings, just 1-9 and a star. This is great in theory because I can have goblins 1 through 6. The problem is the clings don't stick well to clings, and the numbers will fall off easily.

I've been tempted to just use a sharpie and number my tokens, and that shouldn't prevent the cling from sticking to the token, or even the backside, but will also allow for quick deployment if I just want non-descript monster 1 and 2.

 

[MNblockhead]

The Campaign Case tokens are nice, and the clings stick to the tokens well. They also provided small numbered clings, just 1-9 and a star. This is great in theory because I can have goblins 1 through 6. The problem is the clings don't stick well to clings, and the numbers will fall off easily.

I've been tempted to just use a sharpie and number my tokens, and that shouldn't prevent the cling from sticking to the token, or even the backside, but will also allow for quick deployment if I just want non-descript monster 1 and 2.

A little costly, but check out Alea Tools's magnetic status markers. They have magnet circles that you can stick to the bottom of minis to use with the status markers.

To save some money and give weight to your tokens, I used to punch out tokens printed on card stock using a 1" paper punch. I'd glue the cardstock tokens to 1" round steel blanks. The magnetic status markers worked great with these.